PRIMARY TRUST
(West-Coast productions after the NYC World Premiere)
written by Eboni Booth
directed by Knud Adams
CTG, MARK TAPER FORUM, 2026
with Petey McGee, Rebecca S'Manga Frank, Ugo Chukwu, James Urbaniak, Luke Wygodny (music + composition)
set design by Marsha Ginsberg
lighting design by Masha Tsimring
sound design by Mikaal Sulaiman
costume design by Sophia Choi
stage managed by David Lober, Michelle Blair
understudied by Destiny Faith, Wendell Jordan, Mark Rowe, Dustin Stern-Garcia, Jordan Temple
The Los Angeles Times: Red-hot director Knud Adams brings his Pulitzer touch to L.A.
REVIEWS
“Eboni Booth’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Primary Trust is the play we need to restore our souls… Adams conducts Primary Trust as if it were a score, treating the play as a composition rather than as a standard work of stage realism — the right choice for a piece that beautifully deploys repetition and zestfully embraces its storytelling freedom.”
Charles McNulty, The Los Angeles Times
“95 minutes of sublimity. In the role of Kenneth, actor Petey McGee delivers a performance that is as throat lump-inducing as it is uplifting.”
Evan Henerson, Broadway World
“An unassumingly gut-wrenching triumph.”
Imaan Jalali, LA Excites
“Adams, who shepherded the original production and later staged its West Coast premiere at La Jolla Playhouse, returns here with a newly cast ensemble and the same gift for locating enormity in the small. What he understands, and what this staging trusts completely, is that a life lived quietly is still a life worthy of our full attention… One of the most moving things on an L.A. stage this season.”
Sachin Bhatt, Indulge Magazine
“Knud Adams’s remarkably assured direction guides the entire production. His work is defined by restraint, precision, and trust in Booth’s script and his performers. Adams understands that PRIMARY TRUST achieves its greatest power not through theatrical spectacle but through carefully observed human moments. He allows humor, fantasy, grief, and hope to coexist naturally, creating a production that feels both intimate and universal. The result is a startlingly powerful evening of theater that lingers long after the curtain falls.”
John Lavitt, Hollywood Times
LA JOLLA PLAYHOUSE, 2024
with Caleb Eberhardt, Rebecca S'Manga Frank, James Udom, James Urbaniak, Luke Wygodny (music + composition)
set design by Marsha Ginsberg
lighting design by Masha Tsimring
sound design by Mikaal Sulaiman
costume design by Sophia Choi
stage managed by Dean Remington
understudied by Kirk Brown, Morgan Hollingsworth, Scott Striegel, Dianne Yvette
The San Diego Union-Tribune: Playwright Interview
The Los Angeles Times: Best Theater of 2024
REVIEWS
“Knud Adams, who directed the Roundabout Theatre Company’s world premiere of Primary Trust, stages the play with an amiable lightness that exemplifies Cranberry’s motto: “Welcome Friend, You’re Right on Time!” The small cast, much like a small town, manages challenges with a neighborly wink. The simplicity is endearing.”
Charles McNulty, The Los Angeles Times
“Knud Adams masterfully directs the taut, 95-minute production, generously layering in humor to balance the story’s darkest moments.”
Pam Kragen, The San Diego Union-Tribune
“A lovely and meditative playgoing experience... Those who see it may find themselves thinking about it long after departing the theatre.”
Erin Marie Reiter, Broadway World
“Mesmerizing. The show is receiving its West Coast premiere at the La Jolla Playhouse in a production that had the capacity audience at my performance involved, and I mean TOTALLY… Director Knud Adams deserves highest commendation for his skill at shaping the production with a naturalism that melds perfectly with the turbulence boiling within.”
Dan Zeff, Stage and Cinema
(photos by Knud Adams)